The staff at the Feathered Nest at Nether Westcote are celebrating their win as The Good Pub Guide 2014 Gloucestershire Dining Pub of the Year. Good food in pubs is virtually essential and this hotly contested award is the accolade every pub wants to win.

The Good Pub Guide is a national institution ­- a bible for pub-goers. "We have thousands of loyal readers who report to us all the time," says Fiona Stapley, joint editor of The Good Pub Guide. "They keep us in tune with how a pub is doing and we take their comments into serious consideration when choosing an award-winning Pub". Published this week, The Good Pub Guide 2014 (Ebury Press, £15.99) is organised county by county. With regular feedback from 2,000 loyal and eagle-eyed correspondents who look for real warmth and quality of service it is the pub-goers' recommendations, backed up by editor inspections, that determine who's in and who's out year on year.

"Customers now demand - and receive - high-quality home-cooked food using the best, local and seasonal produce available. The food in the top dining pubs is certainly equal to that in the best restaurants, and often better. Good food in pubs is virtually essential - and this covers anything from a really good, hearty lunchtime soup right through to first-class dishes for special celebratory occasions. Imaginative meals from creative chefs using the best local, and quite often their own, produce at prices customers feel are fair for the quality, is paramount. A great many customers prefer to eat in a pub rather than a restaurant because it's so much more informal, and with a working bar there's usually a cheerful, chatty atmosphere, too"

Over one in three entries in The Guide now qualify for a Good Pub Guide Food Award. This reflects real dedication in the kitchen, with chefs often building networks of local farmers, growers and gamekeepers to ensure top-quality seasonal produce, and more and more growing their own fruit and vegetables or keeping chickens and even livestock.

The Good Pub Guide landlords and landladies who motivate and inspire young staff are the driving force behind improving pub service standards in the UK. The editors cite a surge in real professionalism in the industry with increasing vocational training and qualifications, and recently launched schemes for work placements and apprenticeships. The editors call for pubs to name their chefs on menus and websites and help take action to close the absurd status gap between the growing horde of TV superstar chefs and talented pub chefs.